Five things I want you to leave this classroom with:
1.Remember (and discuss with anyone who will listen) the interconnections between literacy, learning and technologies; ed tech is about creating good learning environments and to do this is to understand how literacy, learning and technologies intersect
2.See yourself as an agent of change: teachers are the revolutionaries AND must become the ed tech leaders; your voice is the voice that will create change and not just continue a cycle of unused technology and top-down administrative directives about its integration; take charge on your campus and work to build an ed tech community made up of diverse participants: parents, students, teachers, admin, community members, etc.
3.Take risks and experiment: join that tech team even though you might not agree with their policies/politics, create your own leadership team of like-minded teachers, experiment with your pedagogy and your curriculum
4.View technology not simply as a tool but as a change in practice and relations; before you rush to judge the latest social engagement of youth whether it be friending 500 people or texting all the time, view their experiences as communicative practices—ways of engaging in the world—and ask why they would do such interesting things? Don’t automatically judge their actions based on a tool or based on how you did things, ask questions about their practices and if and how relationships are changed. Then you can judge.
5.Step back from your teaching (and the learning environments you create) and reflect. Reflect. Reflect. Reflect. If you integrate technology into your classroom, have the students do a “step-back” and analyze their learning process with technology just like we did in this class. Reflection, on the part of the teacher AND the student, is key to improving teaching and learning environments.
1. Remember (and discuss with anyone who will listen) the interconnections between literacy, learning and technologies; ed tech is about creating good learning environments and to do this is to understand how literacy, learning and technologies intersect
2. See yourself as an agent of change: teachers are the revolutionaries AND must become the ed tech leaders; your voice is the voice that will create change and not just continue a cycle of unused technology and top-down administrative directives about its integration; take charge on your campus and work to build an ed tech community made up of diverse participants: parents, students, teachers, admin, community members, etc.
3. Take risks and experiment: join that tech team even though you might not agree with their policies/politics, create your own leadership team of like-minded teachers, experiment with your pedagogy and your curriculum
4. View technology not simply as a tool but as a change in practice and relations; before you rush to judge the latest social engagement of youth whether it be friending 500 people or texting all the time, view their experiences as communicative practices—ways of engaging in the world—and ask why they would do such interesting things? Don’t automatically judge their actions based on a tool or based on how you did things, ask questions about their practices and if and how relationships are changed. Then you can judge.
5. Step back from your teaching (and the learning environments you create) and reflect. Reflect. Reflect. Reflect. If you integrate technology into your classroom, have the students do a “step-back” and analyze their learning process with technology just like we did in this class. Reflection, on the part of the teacher AND the student, is key to improving teaching and learning environments.